> Could you key a Drain to Drain ALL CP, in order of their Active
> Points, Only down to Starting Values/Base points?

No, not really. You're not draning a power and Drain has to drain a
power. And draining General Skill Levels (the 10 pointers) doesn't work
either, as not everone buys those (in fact, very few people do in my
experience).

> Thus, you can "reverse" any gained abilites that might have been
> acquired through adventuring. You can set the reversal time to be a
> lengthy session, so things are eventually "relearned." Also, certain
> spells can "heal" some of the damage.

This is sort of the AD&D idea, but a lot of creatures drain levels, and in
most cases the intent is lethal.

> A Side Note: Michael, have you considered converting any of the
> Ravenloft monsters, or monsters from Van Richten's Guide? I'd be willing
> to mail you the books on loan, or get the info to you, so you could do
> some conversions.

I'veenver seen any of those. I know a little about Ravenloft (gothic
vampire setting, right?) but have never heard of Van Richten's Guide. I'm
also tinkering with a few creatures from Call of Cthulhu.

1 - Can you Aid just the AoE: Radius? Granted, if the answer is yes, then
the TK STR needs to be higher.
2 - How much TK do you need to simulate a hurricane? If the creature can
summon a 120+ mph wind, what can that lift/push over?

The Phoenicians were not great philosophers... they pondered the simpler
questions, like "If I stick this spear in you, can I take your stuff?",
"Do you have relatives that would be mad if I took your stuff?", and
"Can my relatives beat up your relatives?"
(c) Doug Robarchek

Yes... but if a group of creatures can summon a big storm, then just
buying a limted increased AoE isn't goingto be sufficent. It does look
like an Aid will be required.

> > 2 - How much TK do you need to simulate a hurricane? If the creature can
> > summon a 120+ mph wind, what can that lift/push over?
>
> Read the article on the HERO web site titled "I'll STop The
> WOrld." They'll talk about speed and STR.

The Phoenicians were not great philosophers... they pondered the simpler
questions, like "If I stick this spear in you, can I take your stuff?",
"Do you have relatives that would be mad if I took your stuff?", and
"Can my relatives beat up your relatives?"
(c) Doug Robarchek

One note: HERO actually suggests using a PhysLim for the 'unfamiliar with
culture', because it isn't the sort of thing that you can overcome by
sheer force of will. No matter how good the aliens EGO is, it's not going
to help him understand why that particular woman is 'hot' when she's
obviously got the same body temperature as everyone else, and she's
wearing hardly anything at all...

> Unfortunately, his Statistics and Skills (Xenopology and
> Xenobiology) cost about 100, and his Cosmic VPP (his only power) costs
> 150. Even with the lims I have now, he falls below the mark.

Frequently, the 'alien biology' also carries with it some quirks.
Superman's vulnerability to Kryptonite, the Martian Manhunter's physical
and psychological problems with fire, that sort of thing. You could
probably justify a Vulnerability or a Susceptibility pretty easily.

If you don't want to go with the kryptonite-style 'pass out and die'
angle, maybe some substance blocks his Cosmic Power or prevents its use
while it is near?

Message text written by James A Jandebeur
>Actually, they continue to say that the two are and always were meant to=

be
seperate, though similar in some ways and easily converted, systems. Did =
I
miss where they say otherwise, or were this post and the post previous to=

it
based on the assumption that they were lying to us? <

I wish I had kept early announcements about New Millennium to back me up,=

but I clearly got the impression that New Millennium/Fuzion was to become=

their main superhero game, and Hero System would be considered a small
niche market of fans that would refuse to die, so Hero would throw them a=

bone every now and then in the form of a Hero Plus book. Then, when New
Millennium wasn't as overwhelmingly accepted as they had hoped, the tone
changed a bit and they begain talking about how Fuzion and Hero System
would be equally supported. Maybe my interpretation was faulty, but I'm
fairly confident that early messages presented Fuzion as a replacement fo=
r
Hero System (it was never stated flat out, because it could have angered
long-time Hero System fans, but if you read between the lines...). Hero
has already told me that I'm wrong about this, but I'm still not convince=
d.
Anyway, I'm not bitter about any of this. I think New Millennium is an
excellent setting (I know this is not the right mailing list in which to
proclaim such a belief), but the Fuzion rules were, frankly, a sloppy mes=
s.
I was excited about Fuzion in concept, but it didn't take long after
perusing the rules that things turned sour. I anxiously await the second=

edition of New Millennium, though, and I really hope that Fuzion is clean=
ed
up to the point where I can happily switch over. I'm also ecstatic that
they are including Hero System stats, so that even if I'm still not
impressed with Fuzion, I will have an easier time with the New Millennium=

setting (which is all I use anymore, and which I find to be much more
exciting than San Angelo).

> I wish I had kept early announcements about New Millennium to back me up,
> but I clearly got the impression that New Millennium/Fuzion was to become
> their main superhero game, and Hero System would be considered a small
> niche market of fans that would refuse to die, so Hero would throw them a
> bone every now and then in the form of a Hero Plus book. Then, when New
> Millennium wasn't as overwhelmingly accepted as they had hoped, the tone
> changed a bit and they begain talking about how Fuzion and Hero System
> would be equally supported. Maybe my interpretation was faulty, but I'm
> fairly confident that early messages presented Fuzion as a replacement for
> Hero System (it was never stated flat out, because it could have angered
> long-time Hero System fans, but if you read between the lines...). Hero
> has already told me that I'm wrong about this, but I'm still not convinced.

I will admit that this was my impression as well. Hero made it sound like
that Fuzion was the greatest thing ever, and we would be so impressed that
we would switch over instantly.

The Phoenicians were not great philosophers... they pondered the simpler
questions, like "If I stick this spear in you, can I take your stuff?",
"Do you have relatives that would be mad if I took your stuff?", and
"Can my relatives beat up your relatives?"
(c) Doug Robarchek

Background:
An alien refugee created by an ancient race fled to Earth.
Persecuted for his pacifistic beliefs and mysterious latent powers, and
charged with assimilating alien DNA of five alien races to unlock his
genetic code's potential- he fled in seach of the sixth, and last, piece
of the puzzle (on Terra-Sol Prime).
He landed in a desolate part of Eurasia, where a team of
scientists retrived his body. He slowly adapted to look human, and
learned how to communicate. He explained that he, too, was a scientist,
and had to complete a mission here on Earth.
He never disclosed what that that mission was (some scientists
suspect he wants to help humanity, or study humans, or become "more
human."), but assisted the scientists in escaping. Now he is hunted. A
stranger in a strange land.

Lucien has done some good. He's known by very few as a mysterious
figure who rescued a number of people from a burning building, himself
unhurt by the flames. He has healed a number of people, stopped bullets
with his hands, levitated, walked on water... he's done the impossible.

...and not too many people are happy about it.

Designers Notes:
Lucien is not too complex. He's the "alien mystic/messiah"
archetype. He has better than average stats. His powers are strange, and
the SFX aren't well defined (are they ever in the genre)? He tends to use
them in straight forward manners: for protection, communication, healing,
and to negate opponent's attacks. He tends to have great respect for
life, and will never use Killing Attacks, or even Energy Blasts, against
living or sentient targets, prefering Mental Paralysis or STUN Drains.
His powers never alter his physical body or appearance (Growth, Shrinking,
Shapeshift, Extra Limbs).

Description:
Lucien is tall, with a very odd combination of features. He has
long dark hair with raven coloured highlights and bright, sparkling,
luminecent amber green eyes. His skin has an odd pearly opalecent sheen to
it, very noticeable in soft moonlight. His bone structure is very
delicate, and his features are perfectly symmetrical.

Disadvantages Notes:
Lucien's appearence is listed as above. He is also
attracts attention because of his classical "alien pretending to be
human" mannerisms. He also has no reservation, no tact, when using his
powers. He simply manifests them.
The small group of scientists who help him each live in their
respective countries, but Lucien feels a bond to them that could easily be
exploited.
The Government considers Lucien a security risk, and wants to
probally vivasect him or destroy him. Due to the mobilization problems
with various government and military groups and bureaucracy when dealing
with such situations, I decided to add the "limited area" modifier to the
Disad. There have been some difficulties determing wether Lucien is
merely a bizzare metanatural, or an actual alien.
The "Intergalatic Witchunters" are the various races who want
Lucien destroyed. They will send minions: shock troops agents, and
assassins, to interrogate or destroy him.
The Christian Fundamentalist Grop thinks Lucien is "a fallen
angel, cast down from the heavens like Lucifer." It dosen't help that
Lucien has the power to preform "miracles." Despite the fact that the
group is small and seldom encountered, they still pose a threat to Lucien.
The Media, who has caught wind of Lucien, sends reporters to
investigate reports. If "figured out," Lucien will be exploited.
Lucien has a totally Alien biology, which is readily apparent upon
closeexamination. His organs are so alien, certain chemicals and
substances will have adverse effects on his body. Also, if he is ever
severely wounded, there is no known way to heal him, since surgical
knowledge geared towards humans would be useless.
Lucien does not understand Earth culture, customs, or society.
While he has learned how to walk (and the scientists have had the good
sense to teach him that wearing clothes is "normal"), he still has trouble
with simple machines (not knowing what they are), culture (what's a hand
shake?), and other random miscelaneous items. It is assumed he can get
over this eventually, learning from his mistakes, and slowly buy this off,
which is why it is a Psychological Limitation instead of a physical one.
Lucien believes that all life is sacred, and will not kill. He
will avoid killing even the smallest creatures, and refuses to destory any
sentient (ex: sentient machines).
Lucien dislikes crowds, loud noises, series of bright flashes, or
other situations that cause senory overload. He gets nervous and stressed
from these things, and is easily unsettled. He avoids cities for this
reason, prefering to stick to small towns and back roads.

Designer's Notes:
Lucien Ambrose means "Immortal and divine seeker of light and
knowledge." He's a very old character of mine who I've kept for a long
time.
This is the first time I've done him in HERO.

(Lucien Ambrose created by Jason Sullivan, character sheet created by
Michael Surbrook)

>happyelf
>
>I think I need to apologize to you and the list for being too vehement in
my
>last response to this particular thread.
>
>Lance
>
>"He who over-reacts in silly ways strangely interpreting... statements
meant to
>indicate culture differances result in communication and hence learning
>differences as somehow demeaning to the individual by laying "blame" on
their
>culture"
>
>

I've seen "needs specialized medical care" as a Phys Lim for alien or
mutant characters, but that's already covered in "Internal Alien
Biology".

Dependence, Susceptability or Vulnerability would tie in with the
character's physical differences -- maybe there's a trace element he
needs that isn't in normal Terran food, or perhaps something commonly
found on Earth reacts strangely with his biochemistry. This would
require a bit of work on his race.

Superman, AFAIK, doesn't have any direct personal memories of life on
Krypton. If this character came to Earth as an adult, though, you could
have all sorts of Psych Lims. A "Code of Honor" that doesn't quite
match up with what the culture he's now living in calls honor,
"Agoraphobia" if he comes from a world like Trantor (at the beginning of
the Foundation series, I understand it changed after the empire fell
apart), "Cannot Understand Emotion" for a Vulcan-like race. However,
this would require even more work on his race.

Leah

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At 12:57 AM 5/7/99 -0700, James Jandebeur wrote:
>> With all due respect to the Hero guys (and everyone else in the gaming
>> industry), you don't really believe that they only tell us what they truly
>> believe, do you?
>
>Absolutely, based on two premises: innocent until proven guilty, and the fact
>that I'm not on the inside, able to know what forces have shaped recent
events.

Well whatever the motivations, at this point it appears that the
realization or decision has been reached to print books and support Hero
instead of using digital exclusively and abandon it, which clearly is the
wisest choice.

>> I expect that Hero has lied to us at least once because they needed to
>> create a particular media image and I don't really mind that.
>
>Well, that's not lying, that's marketing (-;

At 10:15 AM 5/7/99 -0400, Michael Surbrook wrote:
>On Fri, 7 May 1999, David Stallard wrote:
>
>> I wish I had kept early announcements about New Millennium to back me up,
>> but I clearly got the impression that New Millennium/Fuzion was to become
>> their main superhero game, and Hero System would be considered a small
>> niche market of fans that would refuse to die, so Hero would throw them a
>> bone every now and then in the form of a Hero Plus book. Then, when New
>> Millennium wasn't as overwhelmingly accepted as they had hoped, the tone
>> changed a bit and they begain talking about how Fuzion and Hero System
>> would be equally supported. Maybe my interpretation was faulty, but I'm
>> fairly confident that early messages presented Fuzion as a replacement for
>> Hero System (it was never stated flat out, because it could have angered
>> long-time Hero System fans, but if you read between the lines...). Hero
>> has already told me that I'm wrong about this, but I'm still not convinced.
>
>I will admit that this was my impression as well. Hero made it sound like
>that Fuzion was the greatest thing ever, and we would be so impressed that
>we would switch over instantly.

Mine as well and most people's I believe, which at the very least should
give Hero a good idea how their marketing came across and some thoughts on
how to do it next time :)

The Phoenicians were not great philosophers... they pondered the simpler
questions, like "If I stick this spear in you, can I take your stuff?",
"Do you have relatives that would be mad if I took your stuff?", and
"Can my relatives beat up your relatives?"
(c) Doug Robarchek

14 3d6 Entangle, Entangle and Character both take damage (+1/4); No
DEF (-1 1/2), OIHID (-1/4)

16 TK: 30; Only to pull objects
towards user (-1/2), Affects entire object (no squeeze or punch) (-1/4),
Must make sucessful Grab or Entangle maneuver (-1/4), Action/reaction
may be used against character (-1/4), Link between characters may
be destroyed as a Foci (-1/4), OIHID (-1/4) Based on STR (0)

Background:
Edgart was studying at a lab for Neogenic Recombination at
Hexagenome Labs. He was trying to relattice the chains of DNA, reparing
damage to tissues caused by radiation. In order to do the experiment, he
would splice genes from various breeds to get the "essence" of a single
breed of animal. Spiders from various radioactive sites were flown in.
The recombination made the DNA threads parasitic, and after
exposure the cells fused with Edgart, causing a body wide mutagenic change
that was both painful and disfiguring.
Edgart locked himself in his house, but time passed, and he made a
complete recovery.

Designer's Notes:
This is my Spider-esque Archetype clone. It should be noted that
he is is disimilar to Spider Man in many regards- power level, general
mentality, motivation, and origin.
Many of his powers are similar, but not quite the same. I removed
the plot point useful, but inexplicable, Danger Sense (which would have
costed in the range of 60 points), and replaced it with UV
Vision, Sense Air Movement (which bears more similarity to Spatial
Awareness or than it does to Combat or Danger Sense), and Defensive
Maneuver. It should be noted that the Sense Air Movement suffers from PER
modifiers the further away the objects are (hence, Reduced by Range).
To reflect the character's darker, more surreal sci-fi background,
I gave him a Phys Lim that requires him to regularly injest blood, and a
Susceptibility to Neogenics and Radiation that makes him Mutate for
stretches of time.

For those of you who do not like the Phys Lim mechanic, you can
replace it with an addiction to blood, 1 hour, 3d6 from REC, OIHID.
It should be noted that these losses remain, even in his Non Hero ID,
unless he injests the blood.

Description:
The Arachnid, without costume, is somewhat frightening to behold.
Edgart's hair become black, thick, shiny, and bristly, especially thick
on his back. His normal pallor is replaced with a light blue one. His
eyes become one uniform shiny red color. His teeth and nails lengthen and
become black. His lips, gums, inner mouth, and tounge take on a purplish
hue. His physique looses excess body fat, so definition down to muscular
strands and vascularity is visible. His limbs lenghten slightly, so also
gains a few inches in height. Patterns, like cammoflauge, are visible on
his skin in the UV specturm, and shining a black light on him will reveal
them.
The Arachnid can "generate" a costume by bleeding web-material out
of his pores. By doing so, he makes a costume in an interesting, broken
pattern of grey, black, brown, and blue-whites that appear to be skin

tight silk. Individual toes and hair on his body are still visible, but
genitals and most facial features (nose, eyes, ears, usually not mouth)
are covered.

Powers Notes:
Disadvantages Notes:

(Arachnid created by Jason Sullivan, character sheet created by Michael
Surbrook)

>I expect that Hero has lied to us at least once because they needed to
>create a particular media image and I don't really mind that.=20

Well, *I* mind that. We don't lie to our fans. If there's something we can'=
t=20
talk about (like, for instance, a licensing deal in the works), we just don'=
t=20
talk about it, even if asked directly. We don't lie. That's not the way I do=20
business.

However, I'm not responsible if someone misinterprets what I say, or=20
misremembers something I said. Which does happen.

> From: HeroGames@aol.com>
> — Steve Peterson, Hero Games
>
>
> In a message dated 5/7/99 2:49:39 AM, henrik.giese@lgp.se writes:
>
> >Is it possible to buy the old (paper)books straight from Hero Games?
> >
> >I ask because I haven't found the home page yet, and here (in Sweden) no
> >one
> >
> >even knew that Hero Games were still around...
>
> Our home page is easy to find... it's at www.herogames.com. We have a
> complete site revision in the works, along with the online store, that should
> go live in a couple of weeks.

Yes, but having an active Internet presence / webpage is unfortunately not
the same thing as being visible to the retailers. My own experience with
Lone Star Comics here in Dallas was essentially being told that they
don't have web access (or perhaps *use* the web) to keep track of what's
happening with their suppliers.

Probably a shock to everybody here on the mailing list, but I'd even
venture to guess that this is the case with the majority of the retailers.

>Well whatever the motivations, at this point it appears that the
>realization or decision has been reached to print books and support Hero
>instead of using digital exclusively and abandon it, which clearly is the
>wisest choice.

The facts are that because RTG has cut back on their production schedule, we=20
felt it necessary to take over the book line. We can't afford to print many=20
books, though, so we'll still be releasing a lot of products in electronic=20
format. If the reception for the 5th Edition and New Millennium second=20
edition is good, that will let us print more books. Just how much we can do=20
depends on how much we can sell.

>>> I expect that Hero has lied to us at least once because they needed
>to
>>> create a particular media image and I don't really mind that.
>>
>>Well, that's not lying, that's marketing (-;
>
>Same thing, the latter being lying to make money.

I realize that's supposed to be a joke, but marketing should not be lying...=20
not good marketing. If you're lying about something, eventually you'll get=20
tripped up and be worse off than if you didn't lie. Good marketing means not=20
lying to others or lying to yourself about the selling points of your produc=
t.